


Beating ashes

by LadyBraken



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, Dragons are their own warning, Episode 4, Episode 5, F/M, Fluff, King's Landing, Season 8, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-23
Updated: 2019-05-23
Packaged: 2020-03-13 06:15:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18935107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyBraken/pseuds/LadyBraken
Summary: Sansa pushed him gently inside a room and barred the door behind her. She walked towards the window, without looking at him."Jon isn't Ned Stark's Son," she started.She turned towards him then. There was something new in her gaze, in the downturn of her mouth.She wasn't alright and he didn't know what to do.She took a step towards him and dropped onto her knees. Sansa took his hands in hers. They were so warm...He was confused."It's going to be a bloodbath, Tyrion."





	Beating ashes

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! a big thank to my beta, adlertypwriter. I hope all of you sanrion shippers will like this small work!

"Sansa look at me."

She shifted on her feet. Tyrion was looking at her with concern. In a way, it reminded her of King's Landing. "If Jon is at the capital, you'll be the true power in the North. I'd feel much better with the future if you and Daenerys were allies."

Didn't he see? 

"What are you worried about ? Jon is taking our armies with him, your queen still has her dragons-"

"She's your queen too."

Ranks of the slave soldiers passed through the gates. She looked at them. These were not bannermen. These were not loyal Knights. These were soldiers that had nothing to lose. They had been stripped of everything long before they could have the taste of it.

She would know. 

"You don't have to be afraid. Why provoke her? How is that in the best interest of your family?"

His eyes were slightly wide. His fists clenched, his voice low enough not to be overheard. 

"You're afraid of her."

He paused, unsettled. 

"Every good ruler needs to inspire a bit of fear..."

Denial. Like with Cersei, like with everything else. 

"I don't want Jon to go down there. The men in my family don't do well in the capital."

You won't be safe in the capital. 

"Now, as your brother once told me he's not a Stark."

She sighed. Her heart was beating its way through her chest. She turned away, hoping he would not read the truth in her eyes. 

"Are you alright?"

If she told him - because to hell with the vows when she could save so many people- yet Tyrion would be in danger. 

"The people love her, you've seen that. You've seen how they fight for her. She wants to make the world a better place."

The dragon queen already mistrusted her hand, for his failures and his success both. She was sure the Missandei girl had run to her mistress with the words she and Tyrion had exchanged in the crypts. 

"I believe in her."

She didn't answer, and she felt him more than saw him when he turned to go. She had to. She had to. 

"Tyrion. What if there's someone else?"

There was a silence, where only the wind sang. Suddenly, she was moving. She put her hand on Tyrion's shoulder, guiding him inside.

There were things they couldn't talk about in plain air. She guided him in an empty room, careful to slow her strides so he could follow her despite how much she wanted to run.

 

\---

 

Sansa pushed him gently inside a room and barred the door behind her. She walked towards the window, without looking at him.

"Jon isn't Ned Stark's Son," she started.

And she explained. Her voice cool, even, her hands clasped behind her back.

Tyrion was suddenly choked under the familiarity. He felt small next to her, like he had always done next to-

Her breathe was coming hard and her hands were almost shaking.

"I'm sure Jon still loves you as a brother loves a sister."

She turned towards him then. There was something new in her gaze, in the downturn of her mouth.

She wasn't alright and he didn't know what to do.

She took a step towards him and dropped onto her knees. Sansa took his hands in hers. They were so warm...

He was confused.

"It's going to be a bloodbath, Tyrion."

He opened his mouth to answer that- he had told her, Daenerys was the best queen he had seen for now (he tried to forget the screams of men burned alive) - but Sansa looked at him in the eyes, and he kept silent. She was breathing faster, and now he knew what he had read in the cool blue eyes of the Lady of Winterfell.

It was panic.

"You must promise me to come back."

"My Lady-"

"Your queen wants blood and you know it. She won't stop until the country is in ashes." Sansa sighed shakily. "I would like to say that I don't care about what will befall the people in King's Landing, but it would be a lie. That's not me, and that's not you."

She put her hands on each side of his face, her thumbs on his cheeks. "But you, Tyrion, you must promise me that you'll survive."

There were emotions slipping through like water through the cracks of the walls she had built around her. 

"You know I can't promise you that." he said sadly and winced when her face twisted in a way that was way too familiar. Sansa had had this expression many times in King's Landing. 

She stared hard at him and slowly put her brow against his as if leaning against his very being. They share a few breaths as her hand crept into his curls.

Never had anyone touched him like that.

Then, without warning, she took him in her arms tightly, as if afraid he'd disappear.

" I've lost so much... I don't know what I'd do if you died too."Sshe caressed the back of his head with urgency, in a way he had seen mother do to check if their child was hurt," I can't lose you too. "

His arms hugged her back and for a moment, Tyrion left himself drift in the familiarity of her scent. He didn't know what to say, her words rang into him with as much finality as her all-seeing brother's. 

"Promise me you'll do everything to survive. To come back to me."

She was shaking, like a tower on the verge of crumbling and he felt more powerless than he ever had in his life. "Please…" she whispered in his ear, so low he almost didn't hear. 

It was the word that unmaded him. 

"I promise." he swore in a breath, "I promise."

"Thank you..."

There was no tears on her cheeks, but her voice was wet with them.

 

\---

 

Tyrion was standing. 

He didn't know how, or why, but he was probably the last thing standing in the entire city. 

His home. 

He had brought a monster into his home. 

_ It's going to be a bloodbath, Tyrion _

The smell of burning flesh was engraved in his nose, in his mouth, in his skin. He felt like ash, hollow inside as the screams of the innocents,  _ the people he had sworn to protect _ , filled his ears. 

He couldn't even cry. 

He wanted to stay here. He wanted to stay here and be turned into one of the walls so the buzzing in his head would stop. 

_ Promise me _

He wanted to go and talk to Daenerys, maybe to ask why, maybe to cry, maybe to let her know how much of a monster she had become. It was futile, but it was his duty. 

_ A hand pressing on his back, tender, afraid- Promise me _

He wasn't innocent, his life didn't matter, not after all of that, not after the fire, the blood. Explosions of Green Fire as if to mock him

_ I can't lose you too _

No one else would tell her. And it was his fault, for not listening to Varys, for not listening to Sansa - 

_ Please _

His legs moved before his brain did. His hand rose to his chest and a moment later, the golden badge of the hand fell into the burnt dust. He took a sword from one of the corpses, he couldn't quite say which, and rode on a horse he found. 

If the horse's eyes were entirely white, he didn't see. 

The horse rode through the countryside, but Tyrion was in a haze. He vaguely remembered the haggard look of the people he crossed paths with, the taste of the food in his mouth -  _ cooked, burning, like ashes and stone _ -, the sound of the wind in his ears. 

Then, he saw Winterfell. The walls his horse passed  then the door and soon he heard a voice, a sweet voice cold and yet afraid-

He woke up in a warm bed. He felt something on his left side, a shape with wild red hair.

Sansa.

She opened her eyes as soon as she felt him shift and he drowned into their icy blue. 

He felt a sob grown inside him. Tears fell and before he knew it he was pressed against her. Tyrion didn't have the ability to say all he wanted to, that he was sorry, that he was a monster, that he didn't deserve her fondness and even less anything she wanted to give to him, but she hushed him and held him even tighter. 

"Not your fault." She whispered, "you'll be alright, it's over,  _ you came back _ , it's over…" 

His sobs only grew louder and he gripped her like a lifeline. She pressed kisses on the crown of his head, on his cheeks, and for the first time since he had left Winterfell, he felt clean. 

He was home. 

"Thank you," he whispered shakily and closed his eyes. He pressed his head against her chest, and the beating of her heart was louder than the screams of the burnt ones. 


End file.
